


In Case There Are Consequences

by perletwo



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, discussion of Dubious Consent, discussion of brainwashing, post-episode s2e11 Aftershocks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-11
Updated: 2015-03-16
Packaged: 2018-03-17 10:07:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3525197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perletwo/pseuds/perletwo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Simmons visits Bakshi in Talbot's custody, and gives him some food for thought.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

One of Talbot's troops led Jemma Simmons down a dimly-lit corridor and waved her to an interview room. "We'll be on the door if you need us, Agent," he said with a nod toward the soldier already stationed there. 

"Thank you. The security feeds are disabled, as I requested?" She glanced up at the ceiling.

"So I'm told, ma'am." Jemma nodded, took a deep breath and closed her eyes, then opened the door.

HYDRA agent Sunil Bakshi sat behind a bolted-down table in a bolted-down chair, to which he was securely shackled. His head was tilted back and eyes closed, but he sat up straighter and opened them at the sound of the door shutting behind her. Something bright and hot flashed in his eyes for a split-second as he recognized her, before his lids dropped to half-mast and eyes radiated boredom.

"Miss Simmons," he greeted her with the barest nod.

Jemma stopped a few paces short of the table and gave Bakshi a long, hard stare ripe with loathing. He met it with the same look of mild disinterest.

"Why?" She fired the word at him like a bullet.

One eyebrow quirked upward in surprise, but Bakshi volleyed back, "Why not?"

Jemma choked back a sound of disgust, and an even stronger wave of hatred rolled off her. 

"A little more specificity might help," he prodded after a moment.

Jemma considered, then stepped up to take her seat opposite him.

"We have the Memory Machine," she said finally, and at his blank look clarified, "Raina and 'The Clairvoyant' used it on Coulson, to break the mental blocks SHIELD's doctors placed around the experience of his resurrection."

"Ah. We called it - well. Something else. Doesn't matter. Your point?"

"I used it on myself." She let silence draw out between them, but Bakshi gave her no reaction. "I remember everything you and Whitehall did to me after Morocco."

"Ah." A bit of the tension slipped from the muscles of his face.

"That's it? The best you can say? You _brainwashed_ me. Drugged me, slipped under my mental defenses, programmed me to betray my friends. Broke my will, made me a slave - "

" _No._ " He leaned forward in his chair. "HYDRA's got enough drones, Miss Simmons. Breaking you was the last thing we intended."

She bared her teeth in a tight grimace. "What then?"

"Whitehall and I looked at you and saw _potential._ We hoped to bring you over to our way of thinking, groom you to join us in HYDRA's leadership ranks someday very soon." Her scowl deepened, and he pushed on. "The drug was a simple pentothal cocktail so we could ascertain your loyalties. Once we knew you were a SHIELD mole, turning you to our use only made sense."

"And that's not breaking me?" She crossed her arms over her chest.

"You might consider just how young you are yet, and malleable. It's an easy thing to forget," Bakshi said, eyeing her up and down. "All we did was, let's say, apply some tweaks to attitudes you already held. Adjusted your priorities - added weight to some, lessened others - no more so than would be in the normal process of becoming an adult, as had already begun to happen naturally. Made you more open in your thinking to HYDRA's methods and motives. We thought that as you worked with us, over time, you would become more comfortable with our philosophy." He smiled slightly. "We made a good team, the three of us, even in the short time we had to work together."

"...I remember." Her lips thinned, eyes dropped. "And getting me into bed with you, that wasn't enslavement?"

" _No._ That wasn't - we didn't -" He broke off with a disgusted groan, started again. "I didn't put any sexual requirements into your programming. Whitehall would, sometimes. I don't care to have my women be quite so - _pliant_ \- in bed." He shrugged, and Jemma continued to stare balefully.

"Anything you did with me, sexually, that was of your own choosing. Anything I did with you, sexually, that displeased you? I'd've backed off at a single word." She snorted. "Okay, I might've tried a little gentle persuasion. Seduction. But I like a little push-back from a partner. Like it especially from you." Something softened in the lines of his face. "And we were good together, Jemma. If you remember everything, surely you must know _that._ "

She looked away, and silence stretched out and deepened between them. 

"Jemma?" Her eyes flicked back to his face, away again. "Why did you come here?" Her eyes closed, and one hand came up to cover them briefly.

"I took ill shortly after the mission in Old San Juan, around the time of your transfer here. Nausea, cramps, dizziness, vomiting," she began slowly, and he frowned. "I was thinking then of what happened with Raina and the obelisk in terms of a contagion, possible plague, so I ran a very complete battery of tests."

She closed her eyes again, breathed in deep. "I'm pregnant."

Bakshi's breath hissed out in a rush, and he sat back, eyes wide, jaw slack.

"But you see, I didn't know how that could _be_ ," she continued. "I'd had no relationships, no lovers, not even a remote prospect of one on the horizon. If I'd been raped - in the _conventional_ way - there would've been physical signs, marks, even if I'd blocked it out of my memory. So I used the machine. And I found - us."

"Unlock these," he said, flexing his hands against the shackles. She gave him a hard, dark look. "Please." 

Bakshi sighed when she looked away again. "Are you all right? You said you were -"

"Morning sickness. Normal. Expected." She waved that away.

"How far along?"

Jemma sighed. "Eight to ten weeks."

"And are you - is the ba- fe -is it - is everything -"

"Fine. I'm fine. The foetus is progressing normally. Healthily. We're fine." His sigh of relief made her look back at him at last.

"Unlock me," he said again, urgently. " _Please._ " She shook her head. "I - are you going - have you made any decisions? About - the baby? About _us_? And for God's sake don't give me any crap about how 'there is no us.' If you didn't consider me an interested party you wouldn't be here."

A small nod. "You deserve to know. But you must recognize that any decisions regarding this are mine alone. In principle, and in practical terms." She swung a hand around, indicating his entire situation.

"Jemma. I'm asking you, _please,_ whatever you feel about me, whatever you think of what we did - _please_ have this child. Give it away if you must, I'd understand if you couldn't - but please, _please,_ don't destroy it."

"Why would you even care?" She nodded at his shackled wrists. "Under the circumstances."

"Because it's a chance. Because it's a whole world of possibilities that's just opened up." He looked down, then back at her. "Because I know what it's like to be unwanted, even hated, by the person you're most dependent upon, and I swore I'd never -" He broke off, swore bitterly. "Because it's something new. A child that's partly me, and partly you, and partly something all its own? You can't at least be a little curious about that. What they'd be like, what they could become."

Jemma shrugged. "That's neither here nor there. But I grant you there's a lot to be considered." She rose and started for the door.

"Jemma?" Bakshi called after her and she stopped, back to him. "It wasn't just for sex, or just because I could," he said, voice rushed and desperate. "I knew I wanted you by the end of our first meeting. By the end of the Morocco mission I knew I was in love with you." 

Jemma said nothing; she tapped, stepped through the opened door.

" _Jemma!_ " He rattled his hands uselessly against the restraints, swore again. Then stopped, closed his eyes and breathed deep, centered himself.

When the guard came in to remove him, Bakshi said, "Call Talbot. Tell him I need a meeting with Coulson."

The guard said nothing, just removed him from the chair, reshackled him and led him back to his cell.

But, Bakshi knew, wheels were turning.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bakshi has arranged for a change in status.

Ten days later, Agent Simmons took her place at the conference table for a mandatory gathering of senior agents. She'd shaken her head in amusement at being included with the senior agents, but SHIELD's fall had brought about a complete reversal of the hierarchy. An agent with less than two years' field experience who survived the fall could now be considered a senior asset.

She glanced around the room, taking note of what she thought of as the new specialist vanguard of Morse, Hunter, MacKenzie and a clutch of new recruits, and old friends - Fitz, fiddling with a tablet, and on a tabletop monitor Skye observed the meeting from her self-imposed exile on the Bus.

Director Coulson and Agent May entered from the opposite side of the room, and Coulson took his place at the head of the table, standing behind his chair. He greeted them warmly as usual, and took them through a few minor items of old business before dropping his bombshell.

"The main reason for this meeting is to inform you all of a new recruit," he said, glancing at a tableful of curious faces. "We've managed to poach an asset away from HYDRA."

"Is that wise, Director?" Morse asked. "You know they have their ways of locking in an asset's loyalty at HYDRA. Can you be sure this agent's really turned his coat?"

"Glad you asked. No!" Coulson replied. "But in this case I think the odds are good, and we've got countermeasures which I've made a mandatory part of the deal. I really think motivated self-interest will be more than enough, though."

"Bully for them," drawled Hunter. "Some of us may not be all that ready to trust our lives to a HYDRA guy when we're out there in the field, yeah?"

Coulson nodded. "Understood. I wouldn't either. But firstly, the asset will be wearing this -" He held up a black box which opened to display a stainless steel wrist cuff styled like an engraved ID bracelet. "- Skye, I think you can probably attest to how effective this little bauble is at deterring bad behavior."

"Yeah, it's got a bitch of a sting," Skye said with a trace of a smile. "I remember when that sucker was the biggest worry on my mind - boy, _those_ were the days, huh?"

Coulson returned the smile. "In Skye's case the parameters on the bracelet were set to restrict her hacking skills. This time it'll log all the wearer's keystroke activity and alert us to any attempt to contact HYDRA or access restricted files - we'll refine the specifics as we go. It'll also restrict movement to approved areas of the base, and transmit a/v and location data anytime it's taken offsite."

He continued, "More to the point, our new hire's not going to be a field agent. He'll be working in the lab, under Agent Simmons' direct supervision." Bobbi and Fitz's heads both swiveled in Jemma's direction, and she nodded.

May rose and returned to the door as Coulson said, "I think it's time you met our newest SHIELD asset. Some of you may remember him."

All eyes turned toward the door as May led in Sunil Bakshi, dressed in a button-down shirt and casual slacks, hands secured by zip-tie restraints. Bakshi nodded deferentially to Coulson and took a seat, glanced around the room until his gaze found Jemma, and he directed a small smile her way.

A low murmur bobbled its way around the table. "Jemma, you knew?" Bobbi said.

Jemma shrugged. "The Director and I spoke about it. In a manner of speaking. I knew we had someone coming in from HYDRA, but not who." She glanced over at Bakshi and said, "I rather thought we might be getting Dr. Lingonfelter. She had to know she was going to be the goat after the wedding massacre's less than rousing success. Whitehall made that fairly clear in that meeting, the day Bobbi and I left."

"You do recognize the real point of that meeting, don't you?" Bakshi asked Jemma, one eyebrow raised. "Now?"

"Of course. It was to send me running with a message to SHIELD, and trigger my extraction, right?" He nodded once. "Since you'd turned me, you needed a natural chain of events to get me back to SHIELD to spy for you. You were the one who slipped the flexscreens over to Dr. Turgeon's desk, weren't you?"

"Certainly. We'd meant to let you slip out quietly, though - I've no idea where the e-mail blast with that incriminating photo came from."

Coulson sighed. "Raina. She stumbled onto Agent Simmons' deep cover work and tried to parlay the photo into safe harbor with us. I knew extraction was already a go anyway, so I called her bluff."

"Thereby exposing Doctor Simmons to constant danger from every HYDRA agent who received the picture," Bakshi pointed out drily. "But, can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs."

"It's no more danger than I was in already from every HYDRA agent who worked with me, once I was extracted," Jemma retorted.

"Ahem. Pardon, but - who is this guy exactly?" one of the newer field agents asked.

"Ahh. Sorry. Some of you haven't been properly introduced to Sunil Bakshi, former second-in-command to the late Daniel Whitehall. Mr. Bakshi was our guest for a while thanks to Grant Ward, who sent him our way after his own escape," Coulson clarified.

"H'm. That guy? I thought we got rid'a him." Mack rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

"We sent him over to Talbot after using him to pull the trigger on our little sting operation."

"Was he in on that? Had you already turned him?" Hunter caught Mack's eye and said, "No way, mate. We played 'im like a violin, I'm tellin' you."

"Bakshi's change of heart came while he was enjoying Col. Talbot's hospitality," agreed Coulson.

"You trust it, though? Sir. No offense," Bobbi asked. "I mean, some of us have good cause to be suspicious of this guy. We really supposed to buy that a HYDRA true believer's suddenly all SHIELD, all the time?"

"No, you're not," Coulson said. "As I said, I believe Bakshi is here out of motivated self-interest, not a change in his core beliefs. But he's convinced me that his reasons for coming here are solid ones."

"Frankly, Ms. Morse, I don't much care if you don't trust me. I'd be worried if you _didn't_ have your suspicions." Bobbi's eyes cut over to Bakshi, and narrowed. "No, I don't believe in SHIELD's cause, whatever exactly that is these days. But as a stepping-stone to achieving my own aims, I'm willing to serve it."

Hunter's glance bounced from Bakshi to Morse and back. "And what _aims_ might those be, mate?"

Bakshi's gaze flicked briefly toward Jemma, caught the tiniest shake of her head. "Personal business, _mate,_ " he snapped back, "and none of yours. Nice accent, by the by." One corner of Hunter's mouth quirked up and he half-shrugged.

"D'he confide in you, sir?" Fitz asked Coulson.

"He did, and while his motives are private, I'm prepared to accept that they're benign. For now." Coulson held up the bracelet. "As assurances, Bakshi's agreed to wear this, and to submit to a session in the Memory Machine to break any brainwashing that's been done, and to work under Agent Simmons' close watch as his supervising officer."

"Wait, wait!" Bobbi waved a hand in the air. "Jemma! Did I get this right, that you guys were talking about him _turning_ you?!"

"They did," Jemma said softly. "I used the Memory Machine on myself, found it and broke it. After we talked during your interrogation," she reminded Bobbi, who nodded and volleyed back, "Wish you'd told me, though."

"You were - ahhh -" Jemma glanced Hunter's way, "busy then." Bakshi's attention remained fixed on Jemma, but he blinked in recognition of the implication: Morse and Hunter in a personal relationship. Check. "Trust me, _nobody_ is less likely to let this one go even a millimeter over the line on her watch."

"I don't intend to give any trouble, Doctor Simmons. Very much the opposite, really," Bakshi said easily, and drew a glare from her.

Fitz didn't miss the loaded interchange. "Why the lab, though? What qualifications's he got?"

"No academic credentials, Agent Fitz. But I did work closely at Dr. Whitehall's side and I did run the lab at the base where Dr. Simmons worked for several years. It provided me with what you might call a hands-on education, supplemented by a reading list given me by Whitehall and added to as circumstances arose. I know most of the basic lab protocols and can learn any I've missed; I can't imagine I'll be assigned much advanced work though, for security reasons."

Fitz continued to study Simmons. "Jemma? You on board with all this? Really?"

She shrugged wearily. "I suppose I'll have to be, won't I? Orders is orders, after all. And I did agree to supervise our new HYDRA recruit."

"If all that's settled, maybe we can get down to brass tacks." Coulson flicked open a knife and cut the zip ties off Bakshi's hands, then locked the security bracelet onto his offered wrist. Bakshi studied the brushed steel surface critically. "I don't suppose you could make this thing tell me the time?" he asked. Coulson barked a laugh and tapped a few buttons on a tablet; the surface of the bracelet shifted from engraving to a digital watch readout, and Bakshi smiled. "Thank you."

May stepped up behind Bakshi, who worked visibly at not flinching. "You get one hour to settle in to your new quarters. Then it's into the Memory Machine." He nodded, and said, "Best get it over with, yeah."

Coulson tapped his fingers on the tabletop. "If everybody's had their say, I'm calling this meeting adjourned." The agents rose and straggled out of the room in twos and threes, mumbling among themselves. Jemma lingered in her seat. "I'll show you to your quarters, if you like," she said to Bakshi, who smiled and nodded.

Skye's face remained on the viewscreen. "Jemma?" Simmons hummed an acknowledgment, and Skye continued, "Be careful, willya? These HYDRA guys, y'know, they're slick as snot. We both got reason to know that, right?"

Jemma touched her fingers to her friend's face on the viewscreen. "Absolutely careful every minute. Promise." Then passed out of camera range, squared her shoulders, and took the arm Bakshi offered.

* * *

 

Bakshi gestured for Jemma to enter his new quarters ahead of him, then stepped up behind her and closed the door. He put his hands on her upper arms, and felt her tense. "How are you?" he asked softly.

"Right now? Really pissed off," she said, looking over her shoulder. "You and Coulson did an end run around me. You told him about my pregnancy, didn't you?"

"Had to," he said with a nod. "I had to make him see how - invested - I am in this. It's the only way I could convince him of my sincerity. I take it he didn't tell you the details of our talk?"

Jemma shook her head. "Just that he'd poached a HYDRA agent. Not how or why. So you can take heart that I'm at least as pissed at him as at you." He rubbed her shoulders lightly, and she sighed. He bent his neck and let his lips rest briefly on the crown of her head.

"Getting back on point - how are you? Both of you? I assume if it wasn't still both of you I wouldn't have gotten here..."

"I'm fine. We're fine. Tired. Still puking, but a little less."

He stepped around her and sat on the edge of the bed. "I gather your condition's still a secret?"

"From everyone but you, and now Coulson. I'd appreciate it if you'd keep it that way." He nodded gravely.

"Are you - Have you made any decisions yet?" He put the faintest stress on the word _decisions_ , leaving her in no doubt as to which decision he meant.

"No, I haven't. Though there's a window of opportunity that'll be closing before too much longer, and I can feel time dripping away while I dither over it."

Bakshi cleared his throat. "I, ahh. I have something that may factor into your - dithering." He dug in a slacks pocket, produced a small velvet box and opened it to reveal a small diamond ring. Jemma blinked away her surprise. "If having the child in wedlock matters to you - or if you want or need assurances that I'll be a partner to you in this endeavor - well." He swallowed nervously and pressed the box into her hand. "It's - I know we're not - I just wanted to put the offer on the table. And make it clear it's an open-ended offer. Whenever, wherever, no questions asked; all you've got to do is say the word."

She stared at the box in her hand, and Bakshi could see the wheels of thought begin to spin hard and fast behind her eyes. Finally she looked up at him again.

"Tell me this. Would the offer still stand on the table even if I were to terminate?"

His lips thinned, but he nodded. "Yes. Even then. I'd be terribly hurt and I'll probably want to lick my wounds a while. But I still wouldn't want you any less." He reached out for her hand, brushed his fingers against it and dropped them again. "I meant what I said last time we spoke, Jemma. I love you."

She smiled wryly. "And you knew this by the end of the Morocco mission."

"Well. Maybe by the end of the next day." He smiled back, almost shyly. "There was an awful lot to process by the time we called it a night after Morocco."

She put a hand over her eyes, breathed deep and exhaled before meeting his eyes again. "You know I can't say it back to you. Right? Not now." He nodded. "You know I can't give you an answer to _this_ -" she held up the ring box, "- not now." He nodded again. "And I can't - I can't talk to you about the decision I've got to make. About -" her hand rested briefly on her belly. "Not now."

"I think I've made my views on that pretty clear already; they haven't changed, and they're not going to," he said. "Believe it or not, I came here to make things easier for you, Jemma, not harder. You've heard me say that Whitehall is the man I serve? Well, he's gone, and as far as I'm concerned now I serve _you_ \- you and the baby. Anything you need or want that's in my power to get or to do, you've only to say the word. No matter what you decide."

Jemma shook her head, swallowing back tears, and turned to leave. He stood, caught her by the wrist and spun her back. Momentum carried her into his arms, and he lifted his hands to brush her hair back from her face, then leaned in for a soft kiss. She returned the kiss for a long moment, then broke away from him.

"Can't," she said, voice thick. "I can't. I'll see you in an hour."

As the door closed behind her, Bakshi sat back down on the bed, dropped his head into his hands and groaned.


End file.
